It was a remarkable weekend for Dave Smart and the Carleton Ravens men’s basketball team.
An ordinary game against the lowly Royal Military College Paladins Feb. 10 in Kingston, Ont. became a special one for the Ravens when Smart returned to Ottawa just before the game after hearing his wife went into labour.
“When [Smart] said he had to go, the room erupted in instant clapping,” said fifth-year guard Cole Hobin. “All the time he dedicates to us . . . it’s really good to see him happy for something like this.”
The Ravens fared just fine without their head coach, hammering the Paladins to the tune of 115-43.
“We were like, ‘Let’s win this for Dave’ [and] we were even joking about winning it for the kid,” Hobin said.
The Ravens tacked on their 20th straight wins Feb. 11, defeating the Queen’s Gaels 80-47.
Assistant coach and brother Rob Smart took over the coaching responsibilities in the very rare absence of Dave.
“It was definitely a huge difference just because [Dave’s] such a vocal and a commanding presence when he’s there,” Hobin said.
The Ravens made 53.9 per cent of their shots against RMC and went 45.5 per cent from the field in the game against Queen’s.
Forward Tyson Hinz led the team against Queen’s with 13 points, eight rebounds and four assists in 22 minutes on the court.
“We almost took it as a challenge because we knew with [Smart] gone people would think, ‘Oh, we don’t compete if he doesn’t show up’, so we wanted to kind of prove to ourselves that we could compete even though [he] wasn’t there,” Hinz said.
Despite outscoring the Gaels in all of the first three quarters, the Ravens were outscored 23-12 in the fourth.
Even without their head coach the team was quick to chastise their shortcomings.
Fifth-year guard Elliot Thompson said he wasn’t happy with the team’s loss of focus against Queen’s, adding that his team is “obviously not there yet.”
“In the fourth quarter we kind of had a bit of a let up and we can’t let that happen against any top-ranked teams, Thompson said. “[That’ll] just open up the flood gates for them to take over the game.”
With two games remaining in the regular season, followed by the playoffs and if all goes to plan, nationals in Halifax, Thompson stressed that the team has to be fundamentally perfect on defence and rebounding.
“We shot the ball over 40 per cent, which is pretty good, but when it comes to playoffs and nationals you get all the excitement and nerves and sometimes you don’t shoot the ball as well,” he said. “You cant rely on that so I think we just gotta stick to defensive rebounding and make that our focus.”
Hinz said despite the discrepancy in most of the final scores this season, the team is consistently motivated and insistent on improvement.
“You’ve got to treat every game like they can beat you,” Hinz said. “Whether we win by 40 or by 10 it’s about how we play and not as much about the other team.”
The Ravens conclude their regular season with two home games Feb. 17-18 against the University of Toronto Varsity Blues and the Ryerson Rams respectively.
